Abuse, Intimacy, and BDSM

I've been reading the genius S&M feminist writer Clarisse Thorn once again. Her post, "S&M Aftercare... or Brainwashing?" was, as always for Clarisse, a gem. She is such a great writer and does a great job with tough topics like BDSM and abuse, rape, and nonconsent.

This post was all about the similarities between BDSM and abuse and how to tell the difference. There are many articles about this on the web, and it's a popular topic for bloggers. I'm proud of the BDSM community for working so hard to make clear boundaries of what is and is not abuse to keep its members safer.

Clarisse Thorn bravely points out that having an orgasm or enjoying a sexual act does not mean you gave your consent. She quotes one of her readers:

And part of that mechanism, that involves the desire for the abuse to continue, is that many of us are designed to want more intimacy once intimacy has been initiated with a person. Many of us don’t want to be left.

This is terrifying and real for those of us who have been abused. You hate it, but you want more of it. You hate it, but you enjoy it. You hate it, but you are aroused by it. You hate it, but you have an orgasm from it. You hate it, but you feel loved and desired anyway.

The above quote can help us let go of some of our guilt. How can we want it and not want it at the same time? Well... we just can.

Studies have shown that those who practice BDSM are no more likely to have been abused in the past than the general population. However, for those of us who have been abused, it's possible BDSM gives us a safe place to work through unsafe experiences. Clarisse Thorn continues quoting this woman, who said:

For some number of people who have experienced abuse, the greatest split within the self does not simply come from how horrific the acts themselves were but from the feelings of desire and pleasure that can happen in human beings even during horrific unwanted acts. For some of us, BDSM can be a safe way to explore unpacking some of this desire and how these arousal patterns got mixed up with horrific things — or were already hooked up to horrific things and that pre-existing fact was exploited by a harmful person.

Can I just say, "YES!"? Sometimes I want to be insulted and hurt. Because that is how my twisted childhood went: love, insult, hurt, love. My basic understanding of love is that it is stronger after hurt. Cycle of abuse? You bet. Still the best way for me to feel love? Yep.
My first sexual experiences were not consensual. This left me feeling that sex is gross, disgusting, and something that men to when they hate you. Sex = used. I'm learning that my Dom loves me, does not use me, and does not use sex to overpower me or hurt me. That's nice. But when I know I can trust him, that he is not, in fact, abusing me, I still struggle with craving "abusive" sex. I may not enjoy sex by itself, but I love knowing he is using me, enjoying me, abusing me. Mentally, I enjoy it. That translates into the physical, making sex much better than it could ever be just physically.

Clarisse herself goes on to conclude:

I do use BDSM to process past trauma. Not all the time. Sometimes it's just fun, sexy, about achieving the "high" of subspace, feeling owned and relaxed.

But sometimes. Sometimes I feel more wanted if he takes it from me. Sometimes I feel more loved if he makes me cry, then holds me. Sometimes I feel more secure if he's mean to me, then nice to me.

Because then I know what to expect.

I've already blogged about how the BDSM relationship between my Dom and me helps me deal with my mental illnesses. In times of stress, depression, or anxiety, especially when for whatever reason I can't be on medicine or the medicine isn't working, I rely on his power, on our BDSM, to keep me sane. I need that. It keeps me centered. He can control me when I can't.

I need that.

There is no evidence that abuse creates a desire for S&M — but there’s also nothing wrong with people who use S&M to process past trauma.

A Hole in My Heart

I miss BDSM.

I miss the sense of security it gave me. I miss the overwhelming awe and respect I felt for my husband when he had completely overpowered me. I miss the heartrending sobbing that he forced out of me, when I was finally pushed over the edge of my own control and I lost it, and how finally after that I would feel so calm and relaxed. I miss the surge of relaxation that laps through my body when he takes me by the throat. I miss the security of knowing their are consequences when I do something wrong.

I miss it.

My Dom knows this, but he is not interested in engaging in BDSM again anytime soon.

He has several good reasons, although they are hard for me to understand.

He says BDSM is unhealthy for me. That it's an unhealthy part of me wanting it. I get upset, hurt, confused, anxious, and then I crave domination and abuse. I don't come at it from a place of happiness and balance; I crave it when I'm upset. For instance, when we're getting along, I enjoy slow, loving sex. But after a fight, I have too many pent-up emotions. I hate him! He's hurt me! He's a jerk! It is then that I crave sex filled with violence. I want him to hit me and choke me and make me scream and cry. I want the emotional release of all this negativity that was built up between us during the fight. I want him to abuse me, just to "finish it." He thinks we should solve the conflict by talking it out. He is afraid those urges will just be even more unhealthy for me.

He says he is not interested in BDSM anymore because I was too critical. He says I was never happy and we just fought about it constantly. I say I'm never happy without it. Either way we have conflict. I really tried not to be too critical of him. I know men (and people in general) do not respond well to criticism. I tried to start approaching things differently, like showing him blogs that inspired me, or sharing stories from online blogs that I thought were sexy, or posing my wants as a question, such as, "Why don't we do this--?" instead of "You suck, I wanted ___ instead!" But it didn't work. He still knew that all those questions and all those blog suggestions were arising because I wanted something I didn't have. He doesn't like learning from other people's blogs. I love it. I get inspiration and ideas from there, and I see things other husbands do that I want done. He hates it. He just wants to "discover our own kind of BDSM" (I can't see why researching what other couples do can hurt us in our search to do that) and he says he is sick of hearing what other husbands do that he doesn't. I don't try to present it like, "So-and-so's Dom does this, so I want to be with him," but rather I try to phrase it like, "So-and-so's Dom does this, and I want that. Do you think that sounds sexy? What do you think about it?" But I guess it still makes him feel like I'm critical.

The strange thing is, I really tried not to be critical. After every scene, I would tell him what I thought any woman, vanilla or kinky, was supposed to communicate with her lover. I would tell him what I liked and what he did well. And I would tell him what I wanted and what could be better next time. I didn't approach it as a failure of his. I simply would tell him, or blog about it later. I would try to be very complimentary of all the things I liked. I tried to be specific so he would know what to do again next time (he normally didn't do them again, though, no matter how much I praised something). And I would say things like, "And at this part, I really wanted __________, and that would have been so awesome." For future reference, you know? As non-threatening as possible. But he still reads it as "criticism." He says I never said, "That was great." I always said, "That was great, I loved this, but this could have been better." I was just trying to communicate with him my sexual needs for future reference, but I guess it got him down that I was never 100% happy. And the times I was 100% happy, I tried to really praise him and tell him what specifically I liked and what he did so well, but looking back all he remembers are the times I still wanted something different.

He says we fought more then. This is true, but that's just because now I try to ignore my feelings and squash them down. Instead of fighting with him to dominate me, I try to be submissive and not test him. It makes for fewer fights, but it also means I am not getting the subspace high I want.

He says I was rarely happy with BDSM. I always wanted something more, more, more. To me, this is confusing. If he knows I wanted more domination, more roughness, more punishment, more bossiness, more control, then why doesn't he just give me more??? I think maybe he wants a sub who obeys, and I want a Dom who forces me to obey. They are not very complementary desires.

He says I am addicted to BDSM. He says me wanting the "release" of subspace is just like an addiction to a drug. He has made this analogy before. Subspace is, for me, akin to being high. I feel wonderful, relaxed, happy, submissive. A few hours later, the feeling ebbs, and I crash. I will do anything for a fix again! I want him to give me that feeling again, and I misbehave and fight with him to try to provoke dominance to get my "high." I think if he would just do it regularly I wouldn't end up misbehaving or trying to goad him into dominating me.

Yes, subspace is like a high for me. But I'm not sure why he thinks that makes it unhealthy or negative. Can't it be a positive natural high? It feels wonderful. I trust him and love him and respect him. But afterward, when the feeling ebbs and I perceive he is treating me as vanilla again, when I want more control, domination, and consequences, I get angry and bitter. I want my high again! It makes me more attracted to him sexually, it makes me love him more, it makes me respect him more. I see it as a very positive thing for our relationship. But he just wants to be able to go back to normal and not have to put in the "work" of controlling me.

He says BDSM keeps us from communicating. I honestly don't agree with this. I talk to my husband about everything, BDSM or not. I tell him everything I think and feel, all the time. Vanilla or kinky won't change that. But he says that when, after a fight, I beg him to just "get it over with" and finish the job by hitting, insulting, or choking me, it keeps us from talking about it. My defense is that NO AMOUNT OF TALKING HELPS. We talk and we talk and we talk. But I am still sooo hurt by what has happened and by how mean he has been to me. Talking does not allow me to scream and fight and hit and hate him and get all those pent-up feelings out. We've been building up to an explosion of violence and stopped before we got there. I want to use BDSM to experience the release in a safe, controlled way. So I can feel used and hurt and abused, but then afterward to feel safe and loved and understood. Fights do not do that for me. They leave me feeling used and hurt and abused, raw, ragged, and aching. There is a hole in my heart. We can talk talk talk about it, but in the end I just want him to finish it, to hurt me and then love me. That way I can heal. By just talking, I just end up scabbing over the hole in my heart, keeping that little girl who feels hated and abused inside and trying to ignore her. BDSM helps me flush that little girl out, screaming and kicking, and then she is gone and peace resumes.

Since our last big fight 3 weeks ago, I've been asking and asking for BDSM. He is not interested. He says he is tired of the fighting it caused, tired of not being good enough, tired of me never being happy. I have tried to explain to him that there is a hole in my heart. I need something that I'm not getting.

He says wanting BDSM is a want, not a need. This is true. I don't need BDSM like I need food or water or air. But it is a want that is embedded deeply in my emotional state and my psyche. It is a want that is bordering on an emotional need, and I'm not sure he understands that. I do want it, but the more I don't get it, the more it starts to feel like a need. Sex is a want for him, but I try to meet it. Just because I don't "need" something, it doesn't seem right in a marriage that he is completely uninterested in meeting one of my desires just because it makes him feel criticized (which I've tried to fix) and like we have conflict (is conflict always bad? isn't it better to fight out our problems than ignore them just so we can have "no conflict"?).

When he was growing up, his parents fought constantly. Therefore, he hates conflict. Me, on the other hand, I welcome it. I want it to be healthy and I want us to fight fair, of course, but I saw my parents get divorced because one was constantly fighting in an emotional abusive, hateful way, and the other was never fighting and always ignoring problems and saying "It'll be fine." I learned the hard way that neither extreme works! It is far better to embrace conflict when it arises and handle it in a healthy, respectful way, and then deal with it. I have seen a marriage die because no one ever dealt with conflict, so I am ready to jump in and fight out even the smallest problems; it's better than ignoring them and letting love die!

But my husband, he doesn't like conflict. His last major relationship, which lasted like 8 or 9 years, was a total dudd, but he stayed there because they never fought. They also never loved, laughed, had sex, or engaged in passion. But at least they never fought.

After that relationship ended, he was ready to have a relationship where conflict was dealt with. He realized that "not fighting" does not mean you are happy, or that the relationship was healthy. He is willing to put up with my pique and my over-sensitivity because he knows that conflict is not a bad thing for a marriage when it is handled respectfully. We both try to be respectful; although of course we don't always succeed, I think mostly we do. But he gets tired of fighting quickly. While I am willing to fight for months for BDSM in our marriage, feeling I am fighting because eventually we must fight it out to a mutually satisfying conclusion, after a few weeks or months of conflicts he feels drained and he is willing to give up.

He says he "rues the day" we heard about BDSM. I think that is ridiculous since we were already playing with kinkiness and power dynamics before we put a name to it. I've always been interested in being sexually dominated, from my first teenage fantasies to now. Healthy? Maybe not. Stemming from my past abuse? Probably. But that's who I am now, and if BDSM lets me feel abused/loved in a safe place with a loving, safe man, I'm okay with that.

Before I met my Dom, I didn't know that what I wanted had a name or a community. But I still wanted it. I remember feeling turned on when boyfriends would talk dirty to me or push me against the wall. I felt unfulfilled when men kissed me passively. I felt disappointed when one potential date told me he "wasn't interested in hurting anybody". I knew right away we weren't going to be compatible. So I think my Dom is misguided when he says BDSM is causing problems. Even if I'd never heard the name, never read a blog, never joined the community, I would still be craving dominance. Abuse. Love. Power. Violence. Release.

I would still be unhappy when I didn't get it. I would still be less sexually attracted to him when he didn't deliver. I would still have this hole in my heart. But now I now its name and I know what it's possible to get from this lifestyle.

And the worst part is, is when he refuses to dominate me and doesn't want to, but then I ask if he'd be mad if I had a Dom that didn't involve sex, he gets really, really, really hurt and angry. I don't understand how he can say in one breath that he has no interest in meeting my needs and then in the next breath get angry when I want to get them met elsewhere. I guess he'd rather me just feel alone and unhappy? He's okay with there being this hole in my heart, as long as we don't have to fight about BDSM.

I want us both to be happy. I try to be less critical. I try to not tell him what other people's husbands are doing. I try to not test his authority, even when every bone in my body WANTS to and is screaming, "Control me! See my test and rise to the occasion and conquer me!" I try to simply tell him what I'd like. I'd like him to choke me. I'd like him to make me feel like I'm his. I'd like some rough sex.

But he is not interested in giving it to me. Not interested in me getting it somewhere else. Not interested in getting it from him.

He just wants me to live without it. But I know I can never, never enjoy sex without that BDSM element.

I want to love and respect my Dom. I try to stay submissive to him even in little ways. He leads me and takes care of me and loves me and forgives me. I'm lucky to have him.

But sexually... there is something missing. Even outside the bedroom, the power I give him is power I give, not power he has earned or he takes or that he could keep if I took it away. I want that. I need that. This hole in my heart is gnawing on me, and it makes me feel alone.

No-Contact Punishments

I've been reading on FetLife about no-contact punishments.

I'm not sure I agree with that idea, and I'll tell you why.

A no-contact punishment is when a Dom decides that, for whatever reason, he (or she) will basically disappear from the sub's life as a consequence for bad behavior. For a set amount of days, there is no seeing each other, no phone calls, no emails, no texts, and no online chatting.

I'm sure it's an effective punishment. I can't really imagine anything worse than being completely ignored by the person you most love and trust in the world.

But I'm not sure it's healthy or productive.

To me, no-contact punishments smack of abusive behaviors, a type of silent treatment. The silent treatment, according to Dove Christian Counseling and Abuse 101, is still emotional abuse. Abuse 101 says:

The silent treatment...is the worst form of emotional abuse. It is a punishment
used by abusers to make you feel unimportant, not valued, not cared about and
completely absent from the abuser's thoughts. It is used as a form of
non-physical punishment and control because the abuser mistakenly thinks that if
they don't physically harm you then they are not abusers.

My Dom has never used this with me, and he really couldn't because we live together. No-contact punishments wouldn't really work for married couples because we're forced to see each other and at least be in the same house. Still, I know married couples who use the silent treatment (I used to and am still sometimes guilty of it) and it is abusive. Ignoring someone is the opposite of trying to live in peace and find reconciliation.

No-contact punishments, to me, are unhealthy ways to deal with a problem. Sure, it punishes the sub, but it also makes her feel ignored, unimportant, and makes her wallow in guilt. That can't be healthy for her psyche or the relationship.